


Raised Up

by yuletide_archivist



Category: Outsiders (Comics)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2004-12-22
Updated: 2004-12-22
Packaged: 2018-01-25 09:01:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,540
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1642913
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/yuletide_archivist/pseuds/yuletide_archivist
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Friends and family.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Raised Up

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Derry

 

 

"VREEEEEEEEEEEEowwwwwwwwwwwwwwwrrrrr!"

At one end of the meeting room, Ollie was playing airplane with Lian, running back and forth with her raised over his head.

"And you're a *monk*?"

"For your whole life?"

At the other end, Anissa and Grace were interrogating Connor. Anissa was interrogating from his lap. Connor looked vaguely desperate.

Indigo and Shift were seated at the long table, alert and waiting, watching both scenes with equal interest.

"At some point, we lost control of this meeting," Dick said to Roy.

Roy sighed. "Okay. You pry the girls off, I'll put Lian to bed."

Dick nodded sharply and bent down to his boot. Roy watched, wondering what Dick was going to pull out, but then Ollie zoomed past him. "Hey! Hey! Hey!" Roy said, grabbing Ollie's quiver.

"Daddy! Pow pow pow!" Lian pointed her fingers at him.

"Bedtime, sweetie," Roy said.

"It's not my bedtime!"

"Is so."

"Is not!"

"Bedtime for little girls," Roy said firmly in his daddiest voice.

"It's not bedtime for *fighter pilots*! Pow! Pow!"

"She'll make a hell of a Green Lantern," Ollie said.

"She will not. She'll be a doctor or a lawyer."

Ollie made a face. Roy pried Lian out of his grip, ignoring her wiggling. Across the room, Dick had Grace in an arm lock. "He's a big *boy*," she protested.

"He's too polite for his own good," Dick said. Connor was wiping his brow--then Anissa took the hankie from his hand and wiped it for him.

"Hi, Uncle Connor! Hi! Hi!" Lian waved so hard Roy almost lost his grip. Connor waved back.

Roy looked over his shoulder. "Ollie--did you give her sugar?"

"No!" But Ollie looked too innocent. "I wouldn't do that."

"For Pete's sake." Roy turned Lian upside down and looked into her wired little eyes.

"I want to play with Uncle Connor and Uncle Nightie and Auntie Grace and Auntie Nissa!" Lian protested, wiggling vigorously.

Roy turned her right side up again and marched out of the room to his quarters. He'd take her home later. "They're busy. We have to work."

"But they're playing! Why can't I play?"

"They're training, not playing."

"You play with Uncle Nightwing all the time!"

"Do not."

"Do too!"

"Do *not*."

"Do too times two!" she crowed.

"Do not, do not!" Actually, he hadn't played with Dick in a while. Dick was weird lately, even weirder than baseline Bat-weirdness, which was saying something. Roy made a note to find out why.

It probably wasn't anything. Dick was high-strung.

"I don't see why I have to go to bed when Ollie and Uncle Connor are here," Lian said. "I should be able to stay up forever and ever because they're *never* here and it's special."

"Well--" She had a point, and *last* time, he'd let her stay up until she fell asleep in Connor's lap at midnight. But this time, it was business. "No!"

"Yes!" she said.

"No!" he replied.

"Yes yes yes!"

"No no no!"

Being the daddy was tough sometimes.

*

When Roy came back in the room, Ollie was on the same side of the table as Grace and Anissa, attempting to flirt with both of them simultaneously. It was working better on Anissa than Grace, which was good, because *ew.* It was her choice, they weren't *married* or anything, but he really didn't want to be sharing girlfriends with Ollie.

He didn't even want to think about the possibility that they already had. "Let's get this party started," he said. "Ollie, what's up?"

"We're chasing a team of bank robbers," Ollie said.

"They're from New York," Connor said.

Roy waited for the punch.

"So what's their gimmick? Are they super-strong?" Shift asked.

"Do they walk through walls? That would be useful for the purpose of robbing banks," Indigo said.

"No gimmick. Just robbers. They stole about twenty mil in diamonds," Ollie replied. He leaned back in his chair and fingered his arrows.

Roy spread his hands. "So? A bank takes a bath? Since when do you care?"

"I care!"

"The diamonds were collateral for a loan taken out on behalf of the new hospital," Connor said.

"What do you want from us?" Dick asked. His lenses were down and his hands were folded in front of his face, muffling his words slightly.

"Information. We tried--"

"Zzsst!" Ollie pointed at Connor and gestured to his mouth.

"Dad."

"I don't want to talk about it!"

"The police here don't like Dad," Connor said to Roy.

Roy raised his eyebrows at Ollie.

"Fascists," Ollie said.

Grace leaned over and whispered something to Anissa; Anissa nearly lost it.

"We'll help," Dick said. "This should be quick."

"Small jobs aren't unimportant ones," Connor said with a soft smile for Dick. "Thank you."

*

"Number four," Roy read off the list, "Billy Rosso and his gang. What do you think?"

"Possible," Dick said, scowling through his bat-binoculars. "There's activity."

"Bust through the skylight?"

"Wait." Dick flattened himself against the roof. Roy settled beside him on a comfortable rock. Amazing how extremely uncomfortable things got comfortable in this business.

Dick tapped his headset. "Team one, check in."

"We are locating our quarry," Connor said.

"Team two, check in."

"Uh--hang on--COME BACK HERE, YOU SON OF A BITCH--" Grace panted into the communicator as she ran after some poor misguided schmuck. "HAUGH! And *stay* down. Uh, we're on the way, we just ran into a situation. But Thunder just... took care of it. So we're good."

"Team three, check in."

"These men are not the men," Indigo said.

"Back up the Green Arrows. Everyone keep me posted," Dick said.

Roy looked at Dick for a minute in silence.

He was trying to remember the last time he'd seen Dick smile.

"So," Roy said, "do you think Connor is gay?"

"What?" Dick didn't look up.

"He's still a virgin, can you believe it? I popped my cherry when I was fourteen and I had to work *way* harder on girls than he does."

"Green Arrow is a fine soldier," Dick said.

Roy laughed. "Yeah, but he keeps his bow strung for nothing, know what I mean?" He nudged Dick's leg with his boot.

Dick glanced over his shoulder coldly. "His sexuality is none of my business."

Roy's smile faded.

Who *was* this guy? Where was his friend who actually *laughed* at his jokes, who gossiped and played video games and went down for a beer with him after a hard day's work? "What the hell is WRONG with you?" Roy asked.

Dick looked up then, his eyes invisible behind the lenses but his forehead annoyed as all hell. "Does my ability to focus on work bother you? I *am* sorry."

"When did you fucking turn into Batman?"

Dick's mouth twitched into a straight line and he looked back at the quiet apartment.

"Hey," Grace broke in over the headset, "we've got nothing. Empty building."

"Be thorough," Dick said.

"We are. There's dust on the floor."

"Come back us up. We have a possible. I'll call you if we need you." Dick settled more firmly into the rooftop to wait.

Roy stared at the visible knots in Dick's shoulders and the tension all down his back. The Nightwing suit didn't hide anything; Dick had always been transparent. "You haven't been right for a long time, Dick," he said eventually.

Dick's muscles seized up all the way down to his shins. "Stow it, Roy."

"We've been friends since we were *thirteen*--"

"The point of this team is not to be friends."

"Give me a fucking break." Roy leaned over and touched Dick's ribs and Dick jerked away like an electrical shock. "Dude--"

"Here we are! What's up?" Anissa said into the headset as she climbed the fire escape on the other side of the roof.

Roy stared Dick in the lenses until Dick sat up and told Anissa, "Nothing yet. There are four men in the apartment playing cards."

"Poker or hearts?" Grace asked, climbing the ladder behind Anissa.

"Pinochle."

"Oh, they're guilty. Can't trust that game. That or euchre." Grace punched her fist into her open hand. Anissa giggled behind her hand. Dick turned and looked through the window again and Grace and Anissa settled down into a shadow with Roy.

"This is the part of the job I'm not really used to," Anissa whispered.

"The sitting around doing nothing? Yeah. Ollie used to teach me coin tricks," Roy said. He produced a quarter from his pocket and walked it across his knuckles.

"How old were you when you started?"

"Thirteen, like him." Roy pointed to Dick's boot.

"Ollie's... your dad?"

"Guardian. Not the same." Roy paused. "Really not the same." And his relationship with Ollie was nothing like Connor's and he was okay with that, really, fine with that, but it underlined the fact that Ollie was very much not his father.

"So do superheroes get visits from Child Protective Services?" Grace asked. "I always wondered."

"Yes," Dick said, very softly.

And that was a story Roy desperately needed to hear, because he NEVER HAD. "No way. What happened?"

"It wasn't for me, it. . ." Dick stopped again. "We should be working, not gossiping."

"Nightwing, rooftop banter is traditional in all super-households other than that of the gloomy Bat." Roy wondered, actually, if it was. Did Green Lanterns hang out and make green energy cat's cradles on the top of the Empire State Building? He didn't really know them--the old one was never into the sidekick thing and always made Ollie leave him at home, and the new one was kind of a schmuck. Did Flashes--no, Flashes never hung around waiting. Wally went batshit waiting for the toast to pop.

"It's distracting."

"Oh, did you lose track of whose deal it is?" Superman seemed like he would be a nice guy to hang out on a rooftop with, though Roy wondered what the hell they would have to talk about. The weather? How to get your hair to keep its shape on the job? What a dumbass Green Arrow was sometimes?

Probably that last one.

"Yes, actually," Dick said, and Anissa and Grace were *looking* at Roy. Roy looked back.

"Nightwing?" Connor said over the headset. "We have them. Your information was correct."

Dick sat up. "Good. Are they secure?"

"Shift has them contained and the police have been alerted to retrieve them."

"We'll meet you back at the base."

"Well, that was fun," Grace said. She jumped to her feet and offered a hand to pull up Anissa and Roy. "Good thing we met those guys earlier or I might lose those sex-ay bruises on my knuckles."

Anissa laughed. "Maybe we should go hang out in some dark alleys later?"

"*Now* you're talking!"

By the time Roy saw Dick moving, he was already gone.

*

Ollie and Connor were bent over Connor's bow on the meeting table. "Nothing for it. We'd better take it out behind the barn and shoot it," Ollie was saying as Roy, Anissa, and Grace returned.

"I think you're right," Connor sighed. "Hello, everyone. Thank you for your help."

"What happened?" Roy rested his hand on Ollie's shoulder and took a look at the bow. There was a divot a few inches above the grip, probably a bullet wound. The bow would break the next time Connor drew it. "Ouch," Roy said.

"Better my bow than my person." Connor rubbed the back of his head, then slipped off his mask.

Roy patted Ollie's shoulder and went to get Lian.

He found Dick in his darkened quarters with Lian sleeping in his arms. The nanny was snoozing in a chair in the corner. Dick was stroking Lian's hair as if meditating.

"Hey," Roy said.

"You're right, I haven't been myself." Dick didn't look up, didn't flinch at all.

"Nope. You want to tell me what's up?"

"She's a great kid."

"Yeah." He had to smile when he thought about what a great kid she was. She was going to be a world-famous neurosurgeon, he was sure of it, and hire him eight sassy supermodel nurses when he was eighty and crippled up from the hero life.

"What if she wasn't what you wanted her to be?"

"What--you mean gay like Connor? That's nothing, bro--"

"No--" Dick looked up and looked away, breathing out so sharply he ruffled Lian's hair. "You're the wrong person to ask. Forget it, Roy, it's nothing you need to worry yourself about. It won't affect my work." He handed Lian to Roy as he ghosted out of the room.

"Except that it's *already* affecting your work--" But Dick was gone. Of course.

"Huh? Hey. Did you get them?" Nanny Boy Jesse rubbed his eyes.

"Yeah, we got them." Roy rubbed his cheek in Lian's hair. "Let's go home."

Ollie homed in on Lian like a pigeon as they walked out. "I want to see her again before we go. When does she have school?"

"She's not old enough for school. She has soccer at nine, though."

"She's old enough for soccer?"

"Oh hell yeah." Roy grinned. She had a kick that would make grown men cry. "And karate on Wednesdays."

Connor nodded. "Good to start early. I'll never be the bowman that I would be if I had started at three, as Master Jansen did."

"Who's my little bruiser?" Ollie made a fist and tapped Lian's nose.

"Wake her up and you'll pay," Roy said. Lian was out for the count, though; Jesse jingled the car keys, signaling that he was going to bring the car around, and she didn't even twitch. Roy cupped her head against his shoulder and gave Ollie the evil eye on general principles.

And Dick was there in the room like a shadow, looking pale and stressed-out. "Good work, everyone. We'll meet tomorrow at two."

Grace waved her hand at him. She and Anissa were looking at a map of Manhattan on the big monitor. Indigo and Shift were looking up movie schedules on a side monitor, and Ollie and Connor were counting arrows. "Hey," Roy said as Dick started to go. "Hey," and he followed him, and then "hey, *Dick*," very softly outside the meeting room.

Dick turned on Roy. "Don't call me that here! They're not cleared to know my name yet," he muttered under his breath.

"Breathe. In. Out. Come on. Do you want to have a beer at my place?"

Dick's mouth was a hard line. He was looking more and more like Batman every day.

"We can sit across from each other in total silence. We can even turn out the lights. It'll be fun."

Dick used to wear a mask without the lenses. So did Batman, for that matter. At some point they switched, and Roy really wished he knew why.

"Okay," Dick said, his face expressionless.

Lian hiccuped and they both looked down at her. Roy looked up first and saw the brief flash of sorrow--or fear, or something huge and terrible--twisting Dick's mouth. "Okay," Dick said, "but I think I have to insist on the lights."

And he smiled, a little bit, looking like it hurt his face to do it.

"Sure, bro," Roy said, as the others streamed past them.

 


End file.
